The upcoming elective conference of the National Union of Mineworkers (NUM) is set to be a bruising showdown between its president, Dan Balepile, and his deputy, Phillip Vilakazi.
NUM continues to be plagued by warring factions, vying for control of the union’s vast financial resources. Its past two conferences were characterised by debilitating factional fights. The union, SA’s oldest at more than 43 years, is now a shadow of the mighty organisation that led the historic 1987 strike that lasted 21 days and paved the way for the eventual fall of the apartheid regime.
President Cyril Ramaphosa was among its founding leaders and the union’s history is littered with political heavyweights who remain active in congress movement politics such as mining minister Gwede Mantashe, former deputy president Kgalema Motlanthe and Government Employees Pension Fund chair Frans Baleni.
With about 180,000 members, vastly diminished from its heyday of 300,000 members, NUM still manages vast resources, from internal union procurement to overseeing its investment arm, the Mineworkers Investment Company (MIC), with a net asset value of R7.8bn.
The MIC’s long-standing CEO Mary Bomela parted ways with it in March after 15 years and it has yet to appoint a replacement.
NUM leaders and members from two regions spoke to Business Day on condition of anonymity, fearing reprisals from the union’s top brass.
The union leadership is swatting off allegations that its leaders lifted the suspension of a top highveld regional leader accused of involvement in a scam diverting subscriptions amounting to more than R11m. The leader is expected to attend next week’s meeting and the team investigating the matter has since been disbanded.
“The situation is very messy ... the factions want access to resources ... it’s all about money,” a senior union leader told Business Day on Wednesday.
Balepile and Vilakazi worked together to remove NUM’s former general secretary in 2023.
“It has never happened in the history of NUM that subscriptions were diverted. It is causing serious problems in the union. Members want to know why the suspension was lifted. The NEC [national executive committee] decision shocked everyone,” a second source said. In an unusual move, the NEC is understood to have voted on the matter — with a one vote difference in favour of the lifting of the suspension.
A source aligned to the deputy president told Business Day that there was a suspicion that Balepile and acting secretary-general Mpho Phakedi pushed for the suspension of the official to be lifted as they “may be involved”.
The source said Vilakazi was seen as the candidate for the presidency most likely to “clean up” the union — he had served under Mantashe and Baleni.
“He wants to clean up, he wants to get rid of corruption in the union,” the source said.
The elective conference is set to kick off in Boksburg on Gauteng’s East Rand on Tuesday. Politically, it is likely to emerge with a firm decision on whether to support ANC and Cosatu ally the SA Communist Party in its bid to contest the upcoming local elections independently. It is understood that the groupings aligned to both Balepile and Vilakazi are likely to throw the union’s weight behind the SACP.
NUM has been rived by factional battles in recent years — a former senior leader said the solid organisational grounding it once enjoyed has now been abandoned.
“We used to plan ahead, have a solid strategic 10-year-plan with various scenarios ... which we reviewed every three years. It has all been abandoned now.”
The NUM media team did not respond to requests for comment on Wednesday.
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